Book Trailer for ARTICHOKE'S HEART, by Suzanne Supplee (Original Post was on March 6, 2009)

This trailer for ARTICHOKE'S HEART by Suzanne Supplee was created by Mrs. Schauer. It is appropriate for middle grades and up and there is an AR quiz available for the book.

PRETTY LITTLE LIARS, by Sara Shepard posted by Mrs. Schauer

PRETTY LITTLE LIARS
by Sara Shepard
AR: yes
Interest Level: Upper Grades


Last year, one of our seniors, Hannah, begged me to buy all the books in this series...but our budget was completely GONE by the time she asked, so I had to wait until this year to get them. Every person who has read this book,has also flown through the next three in the series, one after the other, so I knew it was a book I needed to read! (Not only that, Hailee read it in two days...so I knew it had to be a page-turner)

I took Hailee, Savannah, Ashlynn and Amy to Fiesta Texas during spring break, and decided to take this book along for company. (How can you tell a high school librarian from a regular person at Six Flags? She's the one reading a YA book in the ride lines!)

From the first few pages, I could definitely see why everyone's reading the series! It's a fast-paced, tension building mystery with lots of catty girl stuff and high dollar fashion thrown in. The "pretty little liars" the title refers to are: Spencer, Hannah, Aria, and Emily--four girls who were all part of a clique in the 7th grade, led and controlled by Alison...who mysteriously disappeared on the last day of school, never to be heard from again. All of the girls harbor secrets...secrets about their parents, about horrible accidents, about infidelity, sexual indescretions, eating disorders...and more. They are bound by their secrets, and the fact that their leader took the most serious of them with her when she disappeared.

It's been four years since Alison disappeared. The girls, now in their junior year of high school, have drifted apart. There are new secrets piled on top of those from the past...each girl is hiding something. When they each begin recieving text messages and emails from "A," the mystery deepens. Could Alison be alive, watching them? If she's back....has she brought their secrets back with her?

I want to read all of the books in this series...Hailee has the second book now...but I'll have to buy them on my Kindle, or put myself on the waiting list for the library copies!

SANDPIPER, by Ellen Wittlinger posted by Mrs. Schauer

SANDPIPER
by Ellen Wittlinger
AR: Yes
Interest Level: Upper Grades

Fifteen year old Sandpiper Ragsdale Hollow has made some mistakes with boys--with quite a few boys. It started as a way to get one certain boy to like her--and it worked, for a while. Then there was the next boy, and the next...and before she knew it, she had a reputation as a "bad girl." She's not sure why, but as soon as a boy really starts to like her, she tires of him, casts him aside and moves on to the next one. When one of her rejected suitors decides to get even with her, at first...it's just annoying. Then, he gets more and more violent and threatening, until his rage turns to violence. Can Sandpiper turn her life and reputation around? Why are some mistakes so much harder to live down than others? Why can some girls get away with certain behaviors, and she's judged for them? And what about the Walker, the mysterious loner she befriends...what secrets is he hiding? Could he be different than the other boys she's known? It would be easy for me to give away everything....but then what would be your incentive to read this fantastic book? I highly recommend it--it's a quick, page-turning read.

LIFE ON THE REFRIGERATOR DOOR, by Alice Kuipers posted by Mrs. Schauer

LIFE ON THE REFRIGERATOR DOOR
by Alice Kuipers
AR: Yes (Thanks, Samantha B, for writing the quiz! I made a 100 on it!)
Interest Level: Middle and Upper Grades

My daughter Hailee suggested I take this book with me on my flight to Ft. Worth yesterday, and I loved it! It is a quick read--I finished it in about an hour--and was sad when I was done. The entire book is made up of short notes between a mother and daughter, that they leave for one another daily, on the refrigerator door. The daughter is fifteen and the mom is a doctor, who is at work so much, that many times these notes are their only form of communication for days at a time. Their notes are full of all the normal things moms and daughters go through. There are shopping lists, requests for money, discussions about boyfriends, and tidbits about their days. The notes take on a more serious tone when the mom is diagnosed with breast cancer...I don't want to give away any more than that, because I'd rather people read the book to find out what happens...isnt' that typical of me?

ARTICHOKE'S HEART, by Suzanne Supplee posted by Mrs. Schauer

ARTICHOKE'S HEART
by Suzanne Supplee
AR: Yes
Interest Level: Middle and Upper Grades

I picked this book up at TLA (Texas Library Association's Conference) almost a year ago. I was so excited about getting it, and then for some reason it took me until now to read it--but I'm so glad I finally did. Since I got an "advanced reader copy" I don't have it on the shelves yet, but it's already been ordered, so it should be here soon--and I'm sure when it gets here it won't spend a lot of time on the shelf.
Rosemary Goode (Rosie to the people who love her) has always been overweight--well, not just overweight--she's always been fat. She got the nickname "Artichoke" in the sixth grade, when she got a new winter coat in an awful shade of green--and the cruel girls at school said she looked like a giant artichoke. Raised by a single mom who got pregnant in high school, she's always soothed herself with food--until one day, she decides enough is enough. This book follows her journey, from being harassed by the popular girls at school, to getting her first boyfriend, and dealing with her mom's battle with cancer--her story is chronicled in the pages. As the pounds melt away, the reader gets to see Rosie come into her own and develop into a better, stronger version of the person who's always been there on the inside. I don't want to give too much of the story away, but I do want to encourage everyone to read it--it's a fantastic story.